The Poultry Keeper

cookie88 · Joined: 08 Sep 2007 Posts: 304 Location: ISLE OF LEWIS

Whats the differnt between an outbreak and one thats not quite an outbreak?

debcat · Posted: Fri Sep 28, 2007 11:05 pm Post subject:

bronskibeat · Joined: 09 Sep 2007 Posts: 1615 Location: Clawddnewydd

Yeah, I have to agree. After the first positive case, Debbie Reynolds said that if more cases were discovered on different farms, it would be an outbreak.............. So, a week later and more confirmed cases with culls and she still wont admit its an outbreak until last night when the Deputy Chief Vet gives a press conference and announces an outbreak.
Funny (sarcasm here) why during the first outbreak of F&M this year DEFRA had daily news conferences but this time round (plus Bluetongue) not a squeek is heard. I have to rely on totally inadequate DEFRA website or tiny paragraphs cunningly hidden in the papers......
I have to say I am far more afraid of Bluetongue than F&M disease. I couldnt bear any of my beautiful sheep to get this terrible disease but short of them all wearing made-to-measure mosquito nets, I cant see how we will prevent it from getting a hold over here. They seem to be pulling the same stunt over vaccination as with F&M. There is apparently a live vaccine but due to their desire to have live exports, that is not an option. Instead we have to wait until Merial (that paragon of British farming) gets its self sorted out and is allowed to restart manufacturing vaccines. The Bluetongue virus is very adept at mutating and becoming resistant to dead vaccines so I shant be holding my breath Evil or Very Mad

milkmaid · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 7161 Location: isle of lewis

deb and i and a few others have been relying on warmwell for up dates ,
they update several times a day and cover ai ,foot and mouth and blue tongue ,if you look at the website do not open the link to fields of fire without toilet roll on stand by Crying or Very sad

,really harrowing reading ,they both scare me ,but with foot and mouth my animals do not stand a chance ,they will die ,where they might justlive with blue tongue ,i've been x referencing types of midge to find out if the highland midge can carry it Shocked

,i cannot find the answer ,i have been thinking of trying to get a midge eatter ,but they are about 500 pounds don't know how good they are ,although heard good reports
it's 11 cases now Crying or Very sad

cattle cannot be exported for 2 clear seasons from a bluetongue area Shocked

this is interesting reading
http://www.suffolksheep.org/index.php?p=620&PHPSESSID=f0d19444f403367df6c4245e4ab7e105
it might help,found it on another forum i hope they don't mind Wink

debcat · Posted: Sat Sep 29, 2007 10:13 pm Post subject:

bronskibeat · Joined: 09 Sep 2007 Posts: 1615 Location: Clawddnewydd

Thanks both milkmaid and debcat, very informative (unlike my previous avenues of info!!)
I totaly agree that with F&M you dont get a chance to save your stock but, maybe I am being overly optimistic here, F&M is quite a distance from us northerners at the mo whereas bluetongue surveillance zone is currently as far up as Notts...... Those B***** midges can get blown miles and miles and you are completely helpless to prevent them arriving. In sheep, the mortality rate is as high as 70% and (being completely mercenary here which when you rely on sales of breeding stock and lambs to survive Shocked

and get absolutely nowt for years of painstaking improvements to your flock) you dont get anything for losing stock to bluetongue UNLESS defra (HA!) culls your stock....... unlikely considering their current track record regards bluetongue.
PLEASE dont get me wrong, I am not one of those who wants the compensation due with F&M. I had a stock ram that was insured and the vet unfortunately drowned him trying to relieve bloat. I would far rather the ram back than the insurance (which by the way the NFU managed to wriggle out of paying). I love my sheep dearly, I have about 60 breeding ewes, 7 stock rams and about 100 lambs (all adult females and 4 tups homebred) and know them all (they dont all have names tho, only those I show or have a really special bond with Rolling Eyes

) and would fight tooth and nail to stop anything happening to them (just ask mum what happened when she tried to make me get rid of most of them........ Evil or Very Mad

) I spend weeks through the spring, summer and autumn months living with them, lambing and getting them ready for shows/sales so have stronger bonds with them than certain members of my family Laughing

so you can appreciate I am not saying this lightly. I have just nursed 2 ewes through a bout of Listeriosis, both have pulled through although it now looks like one has suffered irreparable brain damage and she cant co-ordinate her tongue and teeth to graze or drink unaided so I drench fluids into her at regular intervals and she is eating soaked sugar beet and hay. Her prognosis is hopeless according to the vets unless I am prepared to drench her every day for the rest of her life. She is blind in one eye and has limited vision in the other.
Getting Bluetongue will mean intensive nursing of the sort I have spent the last month doing daily for 2 sheep and I cant begin to contemplate the thought of doing that for over 100 sheep daily. There physically isnt enough time in the day when you live on your own and have no help.
Yes with F&M you lose everything and with Bluetongue you will have survivors but it will not be an easy time by any stretch of the imagination.

OK, enough of my melodrama Rolling Eyes

Put it down to a week of all nighters and sleep deprivation with my newest addition Wink

milkmaid · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 7161 Location: isle of lewis

aaahh got where your coming from you must be so worried
we are dreading ,bluetongue as well ,we have highland midges,and i cannot find out if they can carry it ,although it does say local midges can take over the vector roles from the main carrier ,the advise being given would be impossible to do ,a bit like the svs vet that came up and gave us a lecture on ai ,and admitted at the end he had never been on a local croft Rolling Eyes

,the miss information was really bad ,he talked of our chickens and poultry being in units Rolling Eyes

,and not walking anywhere near water the whole of lewis is near water the sea or burns
i was reading about a case in 1920 when some lord refused to put his herd down (f and m),and nursed then though it took staffing levels of 6 times that he had ,the nursing though this would be so tiring and impossible to do with or than a few
well done on nursing them though the Listeriosis,a freind has just lost his favortite nanny and kid to it Crying or Very sad

debcat · Posted: Sun Sep 30, 2007 7:34 pm Post subject:

the farmers weekly updates their news section a few times a day, the forum on there has upto date info on both bluetongue and fmd
http://www.fwi.co.uk/Home/Default.aspx

bronskibeat · Joined: 09 Sep 2007 Posts: 1615 Location: Clawddnewydd

Thanks peeps. It is so good to be able to bend someones ears over my fears re my sheep. Unfortunately, my parents are at best totally disinterested in the sheep and at worst determined I should get rid of them all. I put my tups out with the girls yesterday and broke my heart thinking about what could happen. I got up this morning to find that the 2nd ewe to get listeriosis has had a relapse overnight just when she was on the way to full recovery. I have rung the vet as I dont feel that she will have the strength needed to fight it off this time. She has gone blind again, her neck has twisted round and she is not able to stand, even if I hold her up. She has lost the ability to swallow and I darent drench her as she will probably inhale the electrolytes. I feel so helpless and sad that she had made such a good recovery and now she is worse than before. Sad how it always seems to happen to the easy going trouble free friendly sheep Sad

These ewes have had no feed except grass since April so heaven only knows where they have picked it up from. We havent been short of grass and the ewes are rotated around 4 fields every 2 weeks. Its a complete mystery.
I have no idea if the Scottish midges can carry the virus or if, like malaria via specific mosquitoes, it is confined to a certain type of midge. Also, maybe it will depend on how high up you are as to whether the midges can live at altitude (like 900 feet is altitude Rolling Eyes

). Regarding the "officials" sent to inform us how we are to look after our stock, most wouldnt know one end of an animal from the other or how to look after them. They have absolutely no idea how the real world works and most dont have an ounce of common sense between the lot of them. They came to inspect my isolation unit once, 9 months after anything had been in it and wanted to know why all the disinfectant baths/buckets were empty and there was no spray at the entrance. Because it hasnt been used for 9 months............ No good, I had to fill the baths and buckets with disinfectant, get a pair of waterproofs and wellies plus brush and put them by the entrance and also fill a spray up to go with them. Why? Because they wanted to see it up and running. What a waste of expensive stuff. Then they wouldnt accept the SVS stamped vet certificates for the sheep being vetted in and then out of the unit. They did however accept me writing down in front of them on an old wool label the date the sheep went into isolation and the date they left isolation. ???????????
OK, rant over!!

Still, the pup is beginning to sleep for more than the 1.5 hours stretch at a time mode he was in so hopefully I'll start and catch up with some sleep now Very Happy

Attila The Hen · Joined: 19 Sep 2005 Posts: 419 Location: Shetland

Milkmaid,

While there has been no work to definitively tell us whether the highland midge Culicoides impunctatus can act as a vector for bluetongue, the fact that more than one culicoides species has been proven to transmit the virus is sufficient to prove cause for concern.

Debcat,

There's quite a good reason why Merial can't start producing the bluetongue serotype 8 vaccine - their relevant facility is based at Pirbright, which of course is at the heart of the FMD outbreak.

Attila

milkmaid · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 7161 Location: isle of lewis

sorry about the sheep it's a bu**er when that happens Confused

i also have to admit if i knew the paperwork and red tape that i was letting myself in for and the control that other people had over my life Confused

, i wouldn't have got livestock at all not even chickens ,but i have them and will do the best i can ,now that i have them,i will follow the rules ,because part of owning livestock is a responsibility to other people and other livestock
ps knew about foot and mouth ,just used to keep livestock in a simpler era
when it was a trip to the police station for moving pigs Wink

,i know a while ago Embarassed

i was also talking to a chap who hasn't got a computer ,elderly crofter ,who didn't know what an earth was going on apart from a couple of letters and what he'd managed to see on the news ,he said he's praying for cold weather as sheep is his lifes work ,for what it was worth Confused

oh and with the feed going up as well ,wonder if shoppers know what's coming this winter

debcat · Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:32 pm Post subject:

bronskibeat · Joined: 09 Sep 2007 Posts: 1615 Location: Clawddnewydd

Ironic isnt it............

cookie88 · Joined: 08 Sep 2007 Posts: 304 Location: ISLE OF LEWIS

up to 20 now cases

cookie88 · Joined: 08 Sep 2007 Posts: 304 Location: ISLE OF LEWIS

up to 24 cases